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Sweden Considers Six Years in Jail For Online Pirates (torrentfreak.com)

Posted by msmash on from the consequences dept.

Sweden's Minister for Justice has received recommendations as to how the country should punish online pirates. From a report: Helene Fritzon received a proposal which would create crimes of gross infringement under both copyright and trademark law, leading to sentences of up to six years in prison. The changes would also ensure that non-physical property, such as domain names, can be seized.

33 of 194 comments (clear)

  1. And how much.... by Sebby · · Score: 5, Insightful

    .... for those that falsely claim copyright infringement on stuff that they don’t own copyright on to begin with?

    --

    AC comments get piped to /dev/null
    1. Re:And how much.... by Cinnamon+Beige · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Hi! I'm happy to see that you're finally (re?)joining the internet, AC! It's been a busy few decades, and a lot has changed since you left!

      One of the things that has changed is the creation of automated copyright claims, which have a known tendency to result in false (and occasionally outright absurd) claims, and IP trolling has risen!

      We've had, since you left, people making copyright claims on original material, degrading what could possibly be counted as fair use, and recorded cases of people making copyright claims against themselves. Proving that you are in fact making fair use, or otherwise not infringing on somebody else's IP, is now a rather expensive prospect. The longstanding laws that actually do cover misrepresenting yourself as the owner of a piece of IP to the court, or demanding payment in return for not being sued (which can bankrupt you to win in some countries) are not enforced. Oh, yeah, and some countries, all you really need to do is be able to afford to keep it going the longest, because the other guy just needs to stop being able to afford to defend himself.

      I am not inclined to bet that a law like this would be drafted to improve the situation, or even keep it from getting worse by having the basic sense to clearly define 'gross infringement.' (I would suggest having part of the requirement be 'make $ off of.') Toss in some penalties for anybody misrepresenting themselves as the owner of IP, and for creating honeypots--yes, there's one case of somebody who was the representative of a piece of IP using a pseudonym to stick it on bittorrent and then go after people who got copies of the IP that way. (Last I checked, the courts had decided that it don't matter if the account name is PirateKing, if you put your stuff or your client's stuff up yourself, the copies gotten that way are in fact legal copies.)

    2. Re:And how much.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Exaxctly. And rapists in Sweden get 2-4 years. Again politicians are bribed by the movie/music industry.

    3. Re: And how much.... by mSparks43 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Or TLDR.
      Sweden is full of corrupt politicians lining their own pockets with media company money too.

    4. Re:And how much.... by negRo_slim · · Score: 4, Funny

      Exaxctly. And rapists in Sweden get 2-4 years. Again politicians are bribed by the movie/music industry.

      Which is a pretty severe, many of these rapists are new immigrants unaccustomed to Swedish legal and cultural norms and most importantly sexual emergencies are a very real thing and traumatic thing for these newcomers.

      --
      On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
    5. Re:And how much.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      It doesn't happen.

      Happened to Mitch Martinez
      IIRC it also happened to Bjorn Lynne.

      Both of those where discovered because the victim was the author that had the rights to the work.
      Most of the false claims are given to people who uses work that are in the public domain or under a permissive license.
      Not being the author they might believe that they were mistaken and stops using the work.
      Those cases doesn't raise headlines so you won't hear about them.

    6. Re:And how much.... by Cederic · · Score: 2, Informative

      A sexual emergency is the defence for raping children.
      http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...

      Note that despite losing the retrial (see http://www.independent.co.uk/n... ) it's still relevant because his conviction was overturned on the grounds his sexual emergency outweighed the right of a 10 year old to not be fucked by an adult.

    7. Re: And how much.... by Thundercat007 · · Score: 2

      That's actually a good point. A buddy of mine writes songs, puts them on YouTube. Within a week a music company will claim ownership of the song and it gets taken down.

  2. Better idea by alvinrod · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Why not just make them do community service instead? I don't think it's really in the interest of the taxpayers to spend tens of thousands of dollars (or Swedish Krona I suppose) to lock up non-violent individuals who are committing what would be best regarded as civil offenses.

    1. Re:Better idea by arglebargle_xiv · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I think they should make the punishment proportional to that for existing crimes. For example leaking private data for your entire population, including sensitive law-enforcement and military data, was penalised by the offender being docked six months pay. So on that scale copyright infringement should attract a fine of 10 Ãre. That's fair.

    2. Re:Better idea by rtb61 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Did you not read the article and I quote "Today there is organized online piracy that has major consequences for the whole community", now for that crime, I mean major consequences for the whole community, perhaps the pirates are raiding towns and mass raping women as well, I mean to say they are claiming it has major consequences for the whole community. What other crimes have major consequences for the whole community, seriously 'MAJOR CONSEQUENCES FOR THE WHOLE COMMUNITY' you just have to capitalise that claim, I mean that is the equal of a war, so the pirates have declared war on the entire community, pirates raping and pillaging every where, oh my GOD the consequences.

      Any dick minister who makes that claim, has to be so corrupted by the pigopolists, from being serviced by young starlets, to luxury holidays to big ole fat off share taxen bank accounts, should not be in the job. That is a pretty wild claim that the minister should be forced by the courts to substantiate else face slander charges. I mean the idiot does know the difference between pirates the kind that copy content using their equipment and their media and their time, they are stealing nothing compared to the pirates that use to raid ships and villages, like the 'erm' Vikings did. You heard of them pirates haven't you, the Viking pirates that used to rape, pillage and plunder all over the place, apparently according to the minister they are back because they are the only people who could cause 'MAJOR CONSEQUENCES FOR THE WHOLE COMMUNITY'.

      Fucking hell the Viking raiders are back, watch out England. PS the only thing I see in Sweden that has 'MAJOR CONSEQUENCES FOR THE WHOLE COMMUNITY' is the foolish unregulated mass migration of the worst from countries with very primitive cultures but hey, if the Viking Pirate Raiders are back, probably they are causing problems too? (don't repeat this in Sweden, you would probably be arrested).

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    3. Re:Better idea by dk20 · · Score: 2

      Posts like yours are always fun to read.. you take something, twist it to suit your needs and then state your view.

      you are correct, theft is a criminal offense.. Legally Theft is defined as :"Theft, in law, a general term covering a variety of specific types of stealing, including the crimes of larceny, robbery, and burglary. Theft is defined as the physical removal of an object that is capable of being stolen without the consent of the owner and with the intention of depriving the owner of it permanently."

      Now can you outline what "physical removal of an object" takes place when somene commits copyright infringement? What "object" has been removed preventing the owner from using it?

      Just because people like you keep calling it "theft" doesnt make it theft.. at this point in time it remains copyright infringement and that is a civil matter.

  3. Pirate Party by BrookHarty · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Why do I think this is mostly aimed at stopping the Pirate party. Life in prison in Sweden is 10 year, And proposed for piracy is 6? That sounds pretty political.

    Also, It's not like Sweden would use politics, for let's say, to go after a person so they could try to extradite him to the US for leaking documents. /s

    1. Re:Pirate Party by aliquis · · Score: 5, Informative

      Life-time in prison in Sweden is a prison sentence until further notice.

      After 10 years in prison for a life-sentence you can ask to have them set a time for your punishment. _IF_ they decide on a time sentence instead if can become no shorter than 18 years. It's common practise in Sweden to let people get out conditionally after 2/3 of the time. On average people get a "24" year sentence in jail which mean that given the 2/3 sentence before conditionally release that they will stay in prison on average for 16 years.

      Life in Sweden isn't 10 years. You can't just sit 10 years on a life-time prison sentence in Sweden. You can get it replaced with a time sentence after 10 years of time.

      As for the pirate party it's very much dead and it sadly used to be all about piracy and hardly anything about freedom of speech and transparency and democracy which would be much more important and interesting. Then some homosexual (?) woman got into the leadership of the party and it become some ... at-least in part some sort of refugee possibly pride party. I guess one can't say the left stole the party because it always seemed to be about theft of intellectual party rather than something more interesting. I guess actual freedom of speech and freedom and democracy in general would be more of a right-wing thing whereas the left definition of "democracy" is rather socialist dictatorship / theocratical/ideological rule without the right and chance to change it.

      I don't think Swedish politicians did it to get Assange. I however think they were perfectly fine keeping Assange stuck in his position and try to force him to come to Sweden no matter what the risk was for him because that's what the law said and if Sweden is good at anything it's usually to follow the terms ..

    2. Re:Pirate Party by DNS-and-BIND · · Score: 2, Funny

      Assange has just told Swedish authorities that he's an Islamic refugee. So naturally they dropped rape charges. We might be on to something here for a way to fight these copyright infringement trolls. .

      --
      Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
    3. Re: Pirate Party by c6gunner · · Score: 2

      He is completely unqualified to be President.

      You say that as if it's a bad thing.

      Personally I think the best way to select a president would be to have a national lottery which randomly picks 5 names, and then let people vote between them. It would probably result in far less corruption than the current system.

    4. Re:Pirate Party by dave420 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Of couse it's impossible for someone to earnestly want to improve something - they must be "virtue signalling". Also, "antifa" is a movement and not a group. And a protest against racism is only against those in the right who are racist. If you feel they were attacking you, you might just be a racist.

    5. Re: Pirate Party by jcr · · Score: 2

      Libertarian here, so I don't have a dog in this fight..

      I'm curious: do you think you're going to prevent a second Trump term if you can just get even snottier than you were when Hillary blew the election with that "deplorables" snark?

      -jcr

      --
      The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
    6. Re: Pirate Party by jcr · · Score: 2

      Giving politicians credit for the economy is like giving fleas credit for the dog.

      -jcr

      --
      The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
    7. Re:Pirate Party by stealth_finger · · Score: 2

      "Trump is not my president" is literally Russian propaganda. They're trying to discredit our democracy and our way of life, and you're on their side.

      Funny how when Obama was pres, everything was his fault and he wasn't above criticism for even the way he wiped his arse. Now Trump is in charge he's infallible and to even question his greatness is to throw your hat with the commie leftist whatever groups and be treasonous scum. The funniest part is Trump was a loud Obama criticizer and his presidency is mainly concerned with undoing everything he did because Obama took the piss one time and Trump couldn't handle it. Imagine if Obama tweeted that he was a very stable genius...

      --
      Wanna buy a shirt?
      https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
  4. Meanwhile Afghan men can murder for less than 2 yr by aliquis · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Mean-while Afghan men can murder people in Sweden and get a punishment of less than 2 years of prison.

    That's because among the adults of Afghans hardly anyone got the right of asylum so they lie and claim they are children. And while applying for asylum it's kinda ok to lie and the Migration office may believe them.

    But then when they actually do kill someone else then it become up to the court to show that they are adults and good luck with that since you don't even know who the fuck they are in the first place.

    And since Sweden don't have the same sentences for actual youth (and even less for people below 15 years old) as for adults they get a very low punishment.

    https://petterssonsblogg.se/20...
    "16" years now, supposedly "15" then.

    So less than two years for knife murder.
    Up to six years for breaking copyright.

    Make sense. The idiots in charge and those who want to keep all the afghans for instance claim we must have rule of law as far as immigration and peopleÂs behavior in response to criminality goes. But it's of course only valid when it benefit the invaders and destroy the life of Swedes. But the system definitely isn't fair or just and we don't have equality against the law in Sweden because the immigrants can do whatever the fuck they want since they can just claim to not be responsibility because they are children whereas actual Swedes can't even if they behaved like the filth coming here which by itself would be very unlikely. So far.

  5. Re:What a s*hole country by aliquis · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Here to:
    https://yro.slashdot.org/comme...

    Afghan man got 1 year and 10 months for knife murder.

    Because he "was 15" when he killed.

    The idiots who believed he was 15 I guess we should have a capital punishment for to save our people from their stupid genes and ideas.

  6. Seems harsh considering ... by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 3, Interesting
    The punishment for actual piracy, studying the prosecution of Somali pirates:

    ... the sentences imposed on pirates for similar crimes range from four years to life in prison. The average sentence globally is 16 years ...

    --
    It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
  7. Re: Worse than rape? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    It isn't rape if the victim doesn't say no, uncrosses their legs, or if there are more than 6 males present. Based on judge rulings and previous non convictions.

    That teenager who did over 10 African men? Asking for it, obviously.

    The girl who had her face smashed in after she went to the police? How dare she deny a black male his right

  8. It makes a lot of sense... by LoyalOpposition · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Helene Fritzon received a proposal which would create crimes of gross infringement under both copyright and trademark law, leading to sentences of up to six years in prison.

    You can get a lot of political contributions from copyright holders; hardly any from murderers.

    ~Loyal

    --
    I aim to misbehave.
  9. cue war on drugs by Black+Parrot · · Score: 2

    Send in a non-violent offender, get back a hardened criminal six years later.

    --
    Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
  10. Re:Meanwhile Afghan men can murder for less than 2 by stephanruby · · Score: 2

    I agree. The system in Sweden is idiotic. It needs to quickly close this loophole, and especially since it takes several weeks to get the medical results back on determining one's age, Sweden needs to promptly fly back anyone who lied about their age directly to their home country (to at least make an example of them).

    That being said, I'm not sure if this blog you linked to is true. And if true, I'm not too concerned about Ahmad only doing two years. He only killed another guy who had previously raped him (assuming the story is true and assuming Google translate translated the blog post accurately). I don't think he should be put in prison for 12 years for that. And the other guy he killed was also technically 17 years old (but that too is probably a fabrication because everyone else thought that he was an adult too).

  11. Re:Meanwhile Afghan men can murder for less than 2 by Calydor · · Score: 4, Informative

    The thing is that there are different kinds of bad situations.

    People who are actually running away from war and fear of death? Sure, give them a helping hand.

    People who walk all the way up through Europe to get to the country with the best financial benefits available? Send them back where they came from. You do NOT call yourself a refugee after crossing through a handful of peaceful European countries just to get to where you wanted to go.

    Sweden, unfortunately, is paralyzed with political correctness. Police officers that finally speak up about crime rates inflating out of control in muslim-heavy parts of the country are fired for subverting the public's faith in the authorities.

    https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    --
    -=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
  12. Re:More than 50% of a life sentence? by Calydor · · Score: 2

    Except it's not. After 10 years you can petition to have 'life' changed to 'X years' which, as I understand it, can never be less than a total of 16 or 18 years.

    --
    -=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
  13. so I RTF proposition (in Swedish) by xpiotr · · Score: 5, Informative

    Basically the proposition raises the maximum punishment and divides it into 2 categories
    1. If you download something at home for "private use", the punishment will be fines and possibly UP TO MAXIMUM 2 years of prison.
    2. If you start a business where you make money of pirating content, you may go to prison 6 month UP TO MAXIMUM 6 years.
    Original proposition + google translate. https://translate.google.com/t...

  14. Re:Meanwhile Afghan men can murder for less than 2 by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Informative

    Sweden agreed to take people from other EU countries, as part of an EU plan to lessen the burden on those countries that are geographically close to the problem by distributing the refugees.

    If the EU didn't try to do this then the frontier countries would just hand those people visas and tell them to leave for other EU countries anyway, and it would be chaotic and create huge problems. It's not been perfect but it's been far better than it would have been if they had done nothing.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  15. Re:Meanwhile Afghan men can murder for less than 2 by dave420 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's also paralysed by people not understanding the rules and getting angry about things they don't understand. You seem to be such a person.

  16. Re:Meanwhile Afghan men can murder for less than 2 by JonnyCalcutta · · Score: 2

    Stop using knowledge and logic, its not allowed. I can sell you 3 cans of mouth foam for the price of 2.